Perplexity's AI-based Comet browser is now free for all

Perplexity shuffles the cards in the field of AI-enhanced browsers with a move expected by many: making Comet freely accessible to everyone, including Italy. The start-up born in 2022 is certainly not the first to bet on a browser where AI is the protagonist. In recent months, such products have sprung up like mushrooms: Opera with its intelligent sidebars, The Browser Company's Arc with Dia and its native functions, Microsoft with Copilot integrated into Edge, not to mention Google, which is accelerating the integration of artificial intelligence in all its products. In this crowded landscape, however, Perplexity has chosen to position itself as the premium option: not a simple conversational search engine, but a complete ecosystem that transforms the browser into a true digital assistant.

The distinctive feature of the browser is a side assistant that accompanies navigation like a digital co-pilot, ready to answer questions about the page being visited, summarise content, manage web information and even navigate autonomously in the user's place. For free users, the experience remains centred on this side assistant, but there is no shortage of additional tools that make Comet more than just a browser. There is Discover, which functions as a personalised news and content feed (a sort of answer to OpenAI's Pulse), Spaces to organise different projects, Shopping that compares prices and scouts offers among various online retailers, Travel with aggregated information on destinations, flights and accommodation, Finance to manage budgets and investments, and Sports to stay up-to-date on sports results and calendars.

For those who choose to pay, the Max plan offers much more. In addition to access to the best performing AI models, there is an email assistant that promises to write replies in the right tone, organise and prioritise incoming mail, schedule appointments and answer questions about messages received. And then there is the real novelty announced by CEO Aravind Srinivas: the 'background assistant', an agentic assistant that works for the user. He can be asked, for example, to send an email, add the cheapest tickets for a concert to the shopping cart and find the best direct flight on a specific date. From the dashboard one can monitor the progress of the various tasks and intervene when necessary, perhaps to press the send button on the email or change something before completion. The assistant notifies when it has finished its work, and can access other applications on the user's computer.

Perplexity's aggressive strategy seems natural if one looks at the startup's numbers. In just over two years, it has reached a valuation of around $14 billion, backed by funding from investors such as Jeff Bezos and Nvidia. This is impressive growth: the company has gone from a valuation of just over 520 million at the beginning of 2024, to 3 billion in August of the same year, to the current 14 billion. On the user front, the platform has grown steadily, from around 10-15 million monthly users at the beginning of 2024 to an estimated 22 million in May 2025. Not explosive growth like that of ChatGPT, but enough to demonstrate the appeal of a different approach to online search. Indeed, Perplexity stands out for its ability to provide answers by citing sources, inserting links directly into the text, a detail appreciated by those seeking reliable and verifiable information, rather than purely AI-generated answers.

However, an open challenge remains: convincing users to change their surfing habits. Comet will have to prove that its agent capabilities - that is, the ability to perform tasks autonomously - are reliable. Errors, inaccuracies or unexpected behaviour in fact risk undermining users' trust. Without concrete gains in productivity, even the most advanced AI browser risks remaining an intriguing novelty rather than becoming an everyday tool.